Along an assembly line, various types of articles, such as for example, diapers and other absorbent articles, may be assembled by adding components to and/or otherwise modifying an advancing, continuous web of material. For example, in some processes, advancing webs of material are combined with other advancing webs of material. In other examples, individual components created from advancing webs of material are combined with advancing webs of material, which in turn, are then combined with other advancing webs of material. In some cases, individual components created from advancing web or webs are combined with other individual components created from other advancing web or webs. Webs of material and component parts used to manufacture diapers may include: backsheets, topsheets, leg cuffs, waist bands, absorbent core components, front and/or back ears, fastening components, and various types of elastic webs and components such as leg elastics, barrier leg cuff elastics, stretch side panels, and waist elastics. Once the desired component parts are assembled, the advancing web(s) and component parts are subjected to a final knife cut to separate the web(s) into discrete diapers or other absorbent articles.
During the assembly process, various components and/or advancing webs of material may be bonded together in various ways. For example, advancing webs and/or components may be bonded together to create side seams on diapers. In some processes, advancing webs and/or components may be bonded with adhesives and/or with ultrasonic bonding apparatuses. In other processes, advancing webs and/or components may be mechanically bonded together with heat and pressure with or without the use of adhesives. In yet other processes, portions of advancing webs may be partially melted with hot air and then pressed together with a press member, wherein the press member includes a plurality of relatively small discrete pattern elements. Thus, each side seam created with such hot air seaming processes includes a plurality of discrete, relatively small, bond sites arranged along the length of each side seam. However, some present apparatuses and processes used to create side seams with pluralities of discrete bonds may have certain disadvantages. For example, some material from the melted portions of the substrates may tend to collect on the pattern elements, causing degraded qualities of bonds and necessitating relatively frequent cleanings. In addition, some diaper embodiments may include elastic belts including elastic strands sandwiched between substrates. When bonding the elastic belts together to create side seams, substrate material may not be adhered to the elastic strands. Thus, some elastic strands may tend retract or snap back from the sides seams after the final knife cut.
Consequently, it would be beneficial to provide a method and apparatus for utilizing hot air seaming methods to bond substrates that are configured to help reduce the need for frequent cleaning and/or to help reduce the occasions of elastic strand snap back from side seams.